


Thy friend, thyself

by BranwellBronte



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Anal Sex, Biting, Blow Job, Books, Christopher Marlowe - Freeform, Hand Job, M/M, Mind Games, One Night Stand, Reading, Rough Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-02
Updated: 2018-12-02
Packaged: 2019-09-05 09:41:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16808107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BranwellBronte/pseuds/BranwellBronte
Summary: Hickey and Fitzjames spend a night playing mind games and have their way with each other, *their* way.





	Thy friend, thyself

**Author's Note:**

> I played with canon a little bit. Pretend with me that Hickey and Gibson are still together after Franklin’s death.

They’re laughing like children who know they’ll get away with their secret. In fact, they look like children, even the older one, the way they’re slightly shoving each other and scuffing their shoes on the floor, casting wild shadows in the lamplight. It’s what made Hickey stop and step to the side, the sight of Peglar pushing Bridgens in the narrow space of Bridgens’s berth. There’s no one coming down the corridor in either direction, most of the men readying themselves for bed most like, it’s getting late, so he allows himself one eye around the curtain. So much laughing. But why are they giggling and burbling half-sentences at each other if they’re fighting? The ice freeze turning them into freaks too, maybe? Going mad from Franklin’s death? The Esquimaux witch magicking them? But no. It only takes a second for his eyes to narrow in on the object.

Peglar looks to be doing his mightiest to force the book through Bridgens’s heart, Bridgens batting at his hands one moment and then trying to shove him back the next. Peglar whispers something as he pushes and Bridgens throws his head back, his shoulders shaking in silent laughter. They continue their gleeful faux-struggle for another moment before Peglar lowers his chin and smiles, breath still huffing a few laughs. Bridgens moves his feet from the fake fighting stance and takes a step closer to Peglar, who looks up when Bridgens presses his hands to the back of Peglar’s. Bridgens holds both the book and Peglar’s hands against his heart and bows his head. Peglar bites his lip as he smiles, a shine of joy in his eyes as he gazes at Bridgens.

It’s the first time Hickey has seen the two of them alone together, and really, he has to applaud them for keeping apart so much on the rest of the ship and out on the ice or else he’d have neatly filed away their status as lovers as a fact of interest.

Much interest. How Billy would love knowing he and Hickey aren’t alone in their terrible vices.

Hickey smoothly draws back from the curtain in time to walk left as Peglar and Bridgens, still whispering, exit the berth and walk right. Hickey hears them descend to the deck beneath. He hasn’t an idea where they’re going at this hour. Clearly not to use the same place he and Billy use, which he’s thankful for, so he wishes them a good fuck and then he’s in the berth. The book, bound in green cloth, is lying askew on top of a stack in Bridgens’s book crate. The cover is rough and mottled with brown spots but the pages flip easily as Hickey thumbs through them. None of them are stuck together. This is a book that has been read recently. Hickey turns it sideways. _The Complete Plays and Poems of Christopher Marlowe_ reads the spine in half-cracked gold lettering. It means nothing to Hickey but it meant something to Peglar and Bridgens, who are lovers, so it might mean something to Billy too. He tucks it halfway in his jacket before he turns and Captain Fitzjames is in the doorway, hands behind his back.

“Mr. Hickey,” the captain says in that voice with the ever so slight drawl that infuses it when he tries to sound superior. Which is always. “I’d a notion you didn’t sleep in a berth that belongs to an officers’ steward. I’d also a notion stealing is an offense worthy of punishment. And I’d a notion you’d like to avoid more punishment.”

Does he have a notion that he’ll ever shut the fuck up? Hickey straightens his back and twitches the corners of his mouth into a smile. This will be easy. “Captain. Begging your pardon.” He softens his voice. “It’s my only recreation these days. Reading, I mean.” He lowers his eyes and pulls his mouth to one corner morosely. “The other men…well they’ve not fancied much of a conversation with me as of late, after what…what happened. I borrow a book from Mr. Bridgens now and then to pass the free time. A book can’t ignore you now can it?” He gives a short chuckle and a slight shrug of one shoulder.

Fitzjames looks unmoved. The buttons on his coat gleam vaguely in the lamplight. His shoes gleam even brighter. The wave of his hair is brushed perfectly smooth under his cap. His shoulders are pushed slightly back, giving him an aura of pomposity. Probably he’s trying to be as imposing as his hero Franklin was. Hickey wonders if he recites sermons in his sleep too. Fitzjames is the picture of officiality: tight-lipped, stiff, and disgruntled.

This is going to be so, so easy.

Fitzjames nods at Hickey’s jacket. “And if you are freely borrowing this book

from Mr. Bridgens, as you say, then you have no reason to hide it, do you?”

“No sir. It’s only this.” Hickey scratches his temple and takes the book in hand. “Well, I’ve got a bit of a reputation now. The men never seen me carrying books around before. Don’t want them to think Mr. Bridgens is trying to take pity on me, the mere the caulker’s mate who no one talks to anymore. Oh he’s the kindest man you’ll meet, I know it, sir. But it all makes me look the lonelier for having no one to talk to and only a book to stick my nose in. So I don’t let them know.” Time to top it off. “It’s about the only comfort I can give myself anymore.”

And that will be that. Hickey tries to appeal for sympathy. Fitzjames is disgusted by him and walks away. Hickey returns the book to the crate and leaves, disappointed but unpunishable. Nothing will ever come from this incident. It’ll be snuffed out with no smoke to remember it by.

Except that Fitzjames has his eyes on the spine of the book. He holds out his hand. “Mr. Hickey.”

There’s going to be smoke after all. Fuck. But he can save this.

Hickey keeps his face composed and he does as he’s told. Fitzjames examines the spine more closely and then flips the book open to the title page. Hickey can see fancy black lettering and a portrait of a man printed on the opposite side. Fitzjames’s eyes flick to the portrait. They rove around it once before he clears his throat and snaps the book shut.

“You chose this volume yourself, Mr. Hickey?”

“Aye, sir.”

“And why this one?”

Well fuck if he knows what’s special about this book. “It was one I hadn’t read yet, sir.”

“I see,” says Fitzjames, but the drawl in his voice is gone. He thumbs the pages open as if he hadn’t just closed the book and returns to the title page, then his eyes flick to the drawing. He stares at the man, and stares, and stares.

_Oh_.

Check, check, check. That’s three new men on the list today. Not that surprising, really. The world is full of men who want to get their hands on each other’s pricks. But Fitzjames just did a piss poor job of hiding it to someone who knows the signs. Is he usually this sloppy? Hickey imagines him at the officers’ dinner table in the early days, elbows on the tablecloth, chin in hands, sighing, gazing at Franklin, writing love letters with his eyes. Of course it’s a fantasy. Fitzjames isn’t a stupid man, just a desperate one. Hickey knows there are other things he’s hiding – he suspects there’s a stronger reason Fitzjames inflates his sense of pomposity than merely because his hero Franklin did so. But for him to be a man of vices too, well, thank the devil, Hickey can string this between his fingers and make a nice pretty knot.

Fitzjames closes the book, more gently this time. He coughs slightly and shakes the book several times before sliding it into his own jacket. He looks up and that wearying glaze of officiality is back. “Choose another volume, Mr. Hickey, and I’ll tell Mr. Bridgens that I’ve borrowed his Marlowe.” And he’s walking away.

He’s walking away with the book Peglar and Bridgens were practically making love over. He’s walking away with the book Billy will like. Now Bridgens will know that Hickey was looking at his books, but they’re not friends, so it doesn’t matter. It’s Fitzjames that matters. He’s getting away with being queer in front of Hickey and getting away scot-free with it, and no, that just won’t do.

The gears only have to turn once in Hickey’s mind.

“Captain,” he half-calls to Fitzjames’s receding back.

Fitzjames looks over his shoulder, squinting. “You can read it later.”

“Aye sir. Just wanted to say I hope you’ll like it. I didn’t read much before I picked it up, I really only saw the drawing, the one of the man.”

Fitzjames makes an irritated noise in his throat. “That’s the _writer_ , Mr. Hickey.”

“The writer, of course sir. Sorry. I didn’t look at it long, if I’m honest. I thought there was something strange about him.”

Fitzjames turns all the way around now and takes a step back towards Hickey, his boot thumping a little louder than usual, than is really necessary. “And why should you think so?”

Hickey shrugs. “Don’t really know, sir. Just something about the way he’s smiling, maybe. I feel like there’s something not quite right about him. Gives me the shakes a little bit. Thinking about it again…maybe…maybe you can return the book right back to Mr. Bridgens when you finish it, sir. I’ll find another.” And he turns back to Bridgens’s berth and pulls the curtain open.

The stomp of boots, right on time. “Now you listen, Mr. Hickey.” Fitzjames’s voice has a roughened stone edge in it as he knocks his fist against the books ccover near Hickey’s face. “You’d do well not to insult a man you know nothing about. You’d do well not to insult him because by doing so, you’re insulting _me_. You’re balancing yourself on a fine wire by calling the writer of this book _not quite right_ and then discarding his book into my grip. Do you care to explain yourself more fully to me right now or should I charge you with impudence to your superior? Your _captain_? Do you want _more_ punishment?”

Hickey makes a show of swallowing and darting his eyes back and forth. It’s almost a shame no one’s around to see them. This is a beautiful piece of theater, even if one of the actors doesn’t know he’s onstage. “Captain. I didn’t mean anything, I swear. I didn’t mean to say that because the picture looks funny, that you’d like the book all the more. I promise, Captain. I know not a thing about any of it.”

He lowers his head, then raises his eyes.

Fitzjames is holding out the book to him.

“In that case, Mr. Hickey, your education begins now.”

***

“You see the text in the upper left-hand corner. ‘Quod me nutrit, me destruit.’ It’s Latin.”

“Never learned Latin, sir.”

“Doubtlessly. It means, ‘What nourishes me, destroys me.’”

“A bit intense, isn’t it, sir?”

“Indeed. But at the same time, wholly suitable.”

It seems hardly suitable that Captain James Fitzjames has invited (actually, ordered) caulker’s mate Cornelius Hickey to his private cabin, at night, to sit side by side at his desk and pour over a queer book. It’s hardly suitable, which makes it eminently suitable to Hickey. Of course Billy will be wondering where he is, but that’s a small price to pay for climbing the ladder of vices even higher.

“Look again at the writer.”

The man looks to be in his early twenties, with big, smart eyes and hair that fluffs up on either side of his face. Hickey imagines the painter trying to brush its wildness into some kind of respectability, but it was obviously averse to any kind of taming. The man also has a small moustache and a crescent of stubble. Hickey doesn’t know the name for the type of shirt he wears, the flaps of collar over the puffy, stifling-looking body and sleeves with an impossible number of buttons and some repeating fancy figure. The man has his arms neatly crossed. This is not a man who admired formality, clearly. This is a man who didn’t want to stand stiffly and look solemnly. This is a man whose eyes look slyly at you straight-on, who is casually lifting an eyebrow, with a small but knowing smile.

He’s very attractive.

“He still puts me off a bit, sir. The way he’s looking right at me and smiling. It’s like he knows me but I don’t know him.”

“Then that leads us to his works so that you shall know him better.” Fitzjames licks the tip of his finger and turns the page to the index. “‘Dido, Queen of Catharge.’ Suicide from lost love. ‘Tamburlaine.’ A conqueror who wants to be greater than God but dies from human illness. ‘The Jew of Malta.’ Death by being dropped into a cauldron of boiling water. ‘Doctor Faustus.’ A man sells his soul to the Devil for knowledge and is dragged to Hell. ‘Edward the Second.’ A king who loses his crown and is killed by internal burning. ‘The Massacre at Paris.’ Most likely incomplete, but murder and the said massacre.”

“That’s a bit morbid, sir.”

“No denying it, Mr. Hickey. But now you understand his smile.”

Hickey raises his eyebrows. “How’s that, sir?”

Fitzjames flips back to the portrait of Marlowe and slides the book closer to Hickey. Fitzjames has taken his cap off and one lock of hair is resting against his cheek. It sways slightly as he leans his upper body an inch closer to Hickey. The corners of his lips turn up and he taps on finger on the table. Buttoned up to within an inch of his life and desperately commanding-looking Fitzjames is letting his hair swing loose and his mouth move freely. What the fuck is he doing?

“You have to smile, Mr. Hickey, if death is your muse. Otherwise, how will you survive your own thoughts?”

Well.

That’s a mite relatable.

And it’s a little disturbing that Fitzjames, Captain James Fitzjames with the ridiculous name and even more ridiculous puffed up chest that he assumes people will take seriously, has just pinpointed the blood red gear in Hickey’s ticking mind.

Fitzjames’s gaze turns calm as he leans back. There’s nothing piercing in it, nothing accusatory. There’s nothing about him that suggests he, the teacher, will slap Hickey, the pupil, on the wrist. Hickey holds his gaze, keeping his most guileless look in his own eyes as the moment creeps on and on. He pushes the corners of his mouth down into an “I don’t know” look.

“Could be, sir.”

“Can be.”  
“As you say, sir.”

“As I say.” Fitzjames raises his eyes to the ceiling and his mouth opens into something like a grin. He’s shifting the ground between himself and Hickey. He’s doing it on purpose. He’s doing it willingly, and, god help Hickey, Fitzjames has some gears that tick in his mind after all. This isn’t right. Hickey readies himself for battle.

Fitzjames drops his eyes back down and turns smoothly in his chair to face Hickey. He tilts his head slightly. “Mr. Hickey. Tell me. What is death to you?”

Well. Pick your poison.

Still. He can win this. Hickey scratches his temple and looks around the room, at the bookcase, the ornamental plates on the shelves, the nook where the bed is. He shakes his head. “Well it’s the end of it all, isn’t it, sir? I’ll admit it eats at me sometimes, what with the men on Beechey we lost so early and then Lieutenant Gore and then poor, poor Sir John, God rest his soul, and-”

“You’ve seen death before those men, before this expedition.”

“Aye sir.” No hesitating, not ever. Might as well be on your hands and knees pleading for mercy if you hesitate. “Could give you a list. I can’t hide that I’m not from the most prosperous town back home. We lost quite a few one year. Everyone caught ill except me it seemed.”

Fitzjames leans back in his chair and drums a few fingers on the table. “Then you know pain.”

“I’ve had my share, sir.”

“Then you know love.”

“Well, sure. I loved my parents very much.”

“That’s not the kind of love I mean.”

It’s getting interesting again. “I’m not sure what you mean then, sir.”

“It’s really quite simple.” Fitzjames takes the book and pages through it until he settles on “The Troublesome Reign and Lamentable Death of Edward the Second, King of England, with the Tragical Fall of Proud Mortimer.” He taps his finger on the King’s name and raises his eyes as he speaks. “I saw a production of this when I was eighteen or so. I was friends with the boy who played Edward and he convinced the manager to let me have a seat in the front row. That was a real coup. The play had been running for weeks and my friend was achieving a level of fame around the city, so much so that brawls broke out over seating. Everyone loved this fresh-faced new player, this rising star, this, this boy who was already a giant. He practically drowned in the roses they all threw at him. He recited his soliloquys with the passion of Cicero and wasn’t afraid to fall on his knees on the stage. He let himself fall so hard that he always had bruises. I’d scold him and he’d just laugh and say they were marks of his greatness. When I was in the front seat that night, he fell _hard_ , not just on his knees but onto his elbow. The pain was so bad that he forgot his lines and he had to be carried off the stage so the understudy could take over. It was the first time he was ever booed. And, as it turned out, it was the last time he was ever onstage. When stars fall, they crash and burn. I went to his house the next day. He was laid up in bed and I asked him what in God’s name happened. Do you know what he said?”

Fitzjames looks over from the book and straight into Hickey’s eyes. There’s raw kindling in them. “He said that he saw me watching him and that I looked so beautiful in my enrapturement, me watching him, that he lost himself in me. And he felt unmoored from the world and lost his balance and his voice. And then in his room, even with the pain in his limbs, he pulled me into bed with him.”

Check. Hickey squints and opens his mouth and Fitzjames snaps the book shut.

“We’re discarding secrets, Mr. Hickey. You love men too.”

Somewhere, Peglar and Bridgens are laughing together.

“Did you think I couldn’t tell? The way that boy Gibson looks at you? Happy because he knows you love him back? It’s in every line of his face. And the way your face is blank when you look back at him. You had really give him better hiding lessons.”

Somewhere, Billy is missing him.

“You’ve no reason to be surprised.”

Somewhere, he had a secret once.

Hickey thinks of all the times he’s pulled his shirt over his head and thrown it aside and combed his hand through his hair while Billy has faced him and leaned back on his hands. Watching Hickey so fervently, with his lips slightly parted, eyes shining as he takes in every inch of Hickey’s body before Hickey takes Billy’s hips and turns him around. Billy’s had no voice then, not to form words, anyway, only to sigh and groan and cry out. Lost in the pleasure of being with his lover. Lost, so lost.

He thinks of the first time he saw Billy, his first day on the ship, the way he’d looked steadily at the other man while Billy looked at him just a few moments too long. How he’d idly pulled at Billy’s cuff after telling him a joke, Billy having to cover his mouth from laughing too loudly. How they’d started sitting closer together during watches and how both of them knew it wasn’t just to keep warm. How Hickey had linked their arms and lead him to the bowels of the ship and pressed him against the wall while lowering his hand down Billy’s trousers and Billy gasped and gasped until they were on the floor, discarding clothes to make a nest to move together on.

Knowing that Captain James Fitzjames has felt some of these feelings and done some of these things isn’t shocking. Hickey had already clocked him in the hallway. It’s that James Fitzjames is shedding his officer’s skin and cutting a vein in his heart and letting it bleed freely on Hickey, then flicking the knife on Hickey with surefire confidence and grace. The honesty of blood running down both of them. What’s the point?

Of course he knows what the point is.

No hesitating.

Fitzjames rises from his seat. “It takes one to know one, Mr. Hickey.”

“Aye sir,” Hickey says, as he scrapes back his chair and falls hard on his knees.

***

“Like this?”

“No. Almost. Straighten your back more.”

Hickey does so, then raises one arm in the air. “Yes?”

“Yes.” Fitzjames takes Hickey’s raised hand and walks slowly in a circle around him. He shakes his head and smiles with all his teeth at Hickey before pronouncing, “‘Why shouldst thou kneel? Know'st thou not who I am? Thy friend, thyself, another Gaveston.’” He stops in front of Hickey and pulls his hand. Hickey rises from his knees. Fitzjames’s hand is warm and he keeps his fingers firm around Hickey’s as he nods at the book in Hickey’s other hand.

Hickey finds his place in the text and breathes out in as fervent a voice as he can manage, “‘And, since I went from hence, no soul in hell hath felt more torment than poor Gaveston.’”

“Good.” Fitzjames drops Hickey’s hand and walks back to his chair, motioning Hickey to join him.

It had been with mild disappointment when Fitzjames, finally with genuine power in his body and voice, that kindling alighting in his eyes, had walked right past Hickey on his knees and stood in the middle of the floor, pointing at the spot he wanted Hickey to kneel instead. Hickey had been ready to pull down Fitzjames’s trousers, was even becoming hard at the thought, when Fitzjames had handed him the book and said, “I’m the King. You’re Gaveston, my lover. You’ve just returned from exile. You haven’t seen me for months, so put some joy into your voice.”

As they settle back into their chairs, Fitzjames runs a hand down the side of his face and then presses his eyes into his palm. “Well, I’ve finally done it. I’ve acted. He was always after me to audition. I told him it was impossible, that I was meant for the sea, not the stage. He wouldn’t speak to me sometimes, after I said that. But he always came back to me in the end.” He rubs his eyes.

Hickey slides a finger along the books spine. “How long were you together?”

“Only a year. But he was the one. He’ll always be the one. There will never be anyone else.” He reaches over and slides the book back to him. “And they wonder why I’m a bachelor. I tell them that each ship I board is my wife, that I enter her with glee. That always gets a good laugh.”

Hickey watches his face. Really, he’s not an unattractive man when he’s not playing at command. The lines of his face have softened and that emotion simmering in his eyes is, dare he think it, captivating. The way his hair rests on his cheek, swinging free, makes it look like there’s something undone about him, like he’s still spilling emotional blood drops.

Hickey keeps taking him in. “But you’ve been with other men since?”

“Most times that I’ve been on land between voyages. I meet one in a pub and then pay for a hotel room. And then I buy flowers and put them on _his_ grave.”

“How did he die?” Hickey feels like a newspaper reporter. He imagines it: “The Queer Daily News, the only paper of its kind, so buggers can’t be choosers.”

“Typhus. An epidemic while I was at sea. It had cleared as soon as I stepped back on shore. He’d been in the ground for weeks. I didn’t visit his parents. I didn’t trust myself not to break down being in that house again, with his room locked up, knowing I’d never shut the door to it again before we went to bed.”

Fitzjames opens the book to the picture of Marlowe. “So, you see what this means for me. I’ve acted for him. And with a man who loves other men, too. He’d be so proud. So happy.” He lets the cover fall closed.

Hickey nods his chin at it. “You had a copy that looked like that.”

Fitzjames inclines his head. “Very similar. But it was red. Like blood. By the way, how many men have you killed?”

Oh.

Checkmate.

Hickey keeps his chin tilted toward the book as he tries to hide how high his chest is rising and then how low it’s falling. The beat of his own blood in his temples and in his wrists isn’t altogether unpleasant, although he knows it should be for any other man. But as long as he’s had thoughts, he’s known that the typical concepts of “should be” are just not made to fit his mold.

He knows he’s not in trouble. Neither of them can bother accusing the other when they’ve both sinned and would be flogged. The whipping doesn’t matter. Shame would gather them to her and neither of them would come out alive in front of the men. So Fitzjames isn’t queer, Hickey isn’t queer _or_ a murderer, and the book belonged to Bridgens anyway and neither Fitzjames or Hickey are supposed to know about it. There’s nothing either of them cannot say to each other now.

Fitzjames knows it. “They think I’m daft,” he says idly. “Silly. That I can’t pinpoint a man who either loves other men or has killed them. How many, Mr. Hickey?”

Their pieces are facing each other on the board.

Hickey reclines in his chair. “It’s not about the number. It’s about who they were.”

“Debtors? Brawlers?”

Hickey scoffs. “Only a man of your rank would suggest debtors before brawlers.”

“Am I correct, though?”

“Maybe not far off.”

“Interesting. How did you know I loved men?”

Death and love. Deeply woven together for this man. “When I saw you gazing at the drawing. You were clearly obsessed with something so very inconsequential.” He smiles. “How did you know I have bloody hands?”

Fitzjames leans back in his chair and raises his eyes with a smile. “I didn’t, until just now. A calculated guess based on how much you tried to hide your interest in the murders in the plays. ‘A bit morbid.’ Death, death, death, and it’s only ‘a bit morbid.’ No frowns, no grimaces, no recoiling.” Fitzjames stands up. The lamplight casts him half in shadow before he steps forward into the light. “You’re a good one, Mr. Hickey. I would wager not even Mr. Gibson knows your whole story. But I’m not daft, and you know how to act. And I think that’s to both our advantages tonight.”

Fitzjames has flung the board into the wall and the pieces have broken. Hickey feels a kind of thrilling fury. He’s never hit a man unless he’s needed to but he channels the urge to slap and punch Fitzjames for teasing out one of his secrets into his desire to have his way with the man who has finally, finally, after all these years, found the words on the blank page he presents to almost all other people. It’s the most stimulating rage he’s ever felt and he smiles at Fitzjames as the tingling in his body quickens and he could smash this table, tear up the book, and fuck his brains out with someone in the ruins. Someone being Fitzjames, but the ruins being unnecessary because of the bed.

Fitzjames eyes his smile closely, then gives him back the ghost of it. “You realize what I’m getting at, don’t you?”

Hickey nods. “Of course. We’re going to bed, just once, and then you’ll be my Captain again and I’ll be the caulker’s mate and I’ll call you ‘Captain’ and you’ll call me ‘Mr.’”

Fitzjames leans one hand on the back of his chair, the wave of hair falling forward. He doesn’t brush it back. “You’ve noticed something else? That I’ve not asked you any questions about your love of men, your experiences with them, how you came to know yourself.”

Hickey shrugs. “It’s been noticeable, yes. I could write a decent biography of you but the only sentence you have about me is, ‘He has stained hands and he fucks that Gibson boy a few decks below.’”

The ghost of Fitzjames’s smile solidifies into a living thing. “And that’s the way it will stay,” he says, almost with mirth. “I don’t want to know about you, Hickey, because I really don’t care. If my heart weren’t broken, I might care, I might try to go after you in earnest, but I never will. I will touch you and you’ll touch me and I’ll get the urge out of my veins and then we’ll part. My heart is his, forever. You have only my body tonight. Not my heart.”

Hickey can’t stop his eyes from rolling as far back as they can. He inclines his head toward the bed. “I don’t want your heart. Your heart won’t get me off. So let’s go, shall we?”

***

Fitzjames is clearly in no rush to get off. As soon as all their clothes are pulled off, Hickey tries to push him down but Fitzjames pulls him up by the shoulders so that they’re kneeling, facing each other. Fitzjames presses his face into the crook of Hickey’s neck and runs his palms over his back, fast, grasping him. Hickey holds Fitzjames’s head against him, curling his fingers up into his hair. Fitzjames pulls Hickey even closer to him so that their chests are flush against each other. Hickey is reminded of Peglar looking as if he’s trying to push the book into Bridgens’s chest, this idea of absorption, union. It’s different from the way Billy holds him, softly, even when his arms are locked tight around him.

There’s nothing soft about the way Fitzjames is holding him, fingers digging into his shoulder blades as he keeps trying to pull Hickey to him. If Hickey falls back even half an inch away, Fitzjames is hauling him closer, rougher each time. Hickey combs his fingers quickly through Fitzjames’s hair, pulling through the knots and listening with satisfaction every time Fitzjames gasps softly and jolts his head from the pain. That earns him a fingernail traced up and down his spine and it actually feels incredible. Hickey didn’t think anything sharp on his back would ever feel good again and he’s proved gloriously wrong as Fitzjames presses his nail into Hickey’s flesh and Hickey keeps pulling knots through his hair.

The ice chooses this moment to squeeze the ship, the hull groaning and making cranking noises. They’re engulfed in the sound from every side and Hickey predicts Fitzjames will take the opportunity to be louder, but it’s Hickey who makes the first sound. Fitzjames releases his nail from Hickey’s back, pulls him roughly closer, then bites at Hickey’s shoulder. Hickey’s breath catches and now he’s the one grasping at Fitzjames’s back as Fitzjames sucks and nips along his shoulder. There will be a constellation of little bruises soon and Hickey finds that he wants to see them, touch them. He lets his head fall back for a few moments as Fitzjames licks down his shoulder, then Hickey reaches down and wraps his fingers slowly around Fitzjames’s cock. The ship is still creaking so Fitzjames cries into Hickey’s shoulder and moves his hips up. He doesn’t release his mouth from Hickey’s skin but keeps his teeth and tongue on it even as he lets Hickey slide his hand up and down his length.

The ship makes a stuttering noise and Fitzjames’s breath comes in little gasps. Hickey hums at both the pleasure of the warm wetness on his shoulder and the warm cock in his grip. Just as Fitzjames is about to buck his hips up again, Hickey pulls his hand away, leans in swiftly to the place just where Fitzjames’s collar will cover his skin, and sucks hard at it. He imagines that he can feel the blood vessels breaking as he keeps the patch of skin between his teeth. Fitzjames shifts on the bed as he cries through gritted teeth and when he pulls himself straight again, his cock is rubbing against Hickey’s. The jolt of pleasure at finally having his cock touched makes Hickey release his mouth from Fitzjames’s skin. He pushes himself closer until their cocks are pressed together and he’s moaning along with the ship’s shuddering noise. Fitzjames is breathing hard and he moves his hand to grasp both of their cocks. If Hickey lets himself go this soon, he could likely come from this alone, so it won’t do. If there’s one thing he’s going to make sure of, it’s that he comes last.

He pulls away from Fitzjames and shoves him back against the pillows as hard as he can. Fitzjames barely has time to register his surprise before Hickey falls forward onto him with his head on the other side of Fitzjames’s neck, sucking the other spot right where his shoulder meets his neck. Hickey briefly removes his mouth to lick one of his fingers and rub it back and forth on one of Fitzjames’s nipples. Fitzjames muffles a scream with one hand as he arches his back and draws one knee up and writhes under Hickey. Hickey gently swirls his fingertip around Fitzjames’s nipple before taking it between two fingers and pinching it ever so slightly, then removes his fingers completely. Fitzjames is twisting under him and as Hickey moves his mouth lower, Fitzjames shoves back on his elbows and moves his cock in line with Hickey’s mouth. Hickey hums over it for a few moments and moves his head to one side, then the other, as Fitzjames desperately tries to position himself in front of Hickey’s lips.

Hickey tongues the tip once, then pulls back. Fitzjames groans in frustration and manages to take a few strands of Hickey’s hanging hair in his fingers. Hickey swings his head away quickly, freeing his hair, and moves back down, taking the whole head of Fitzjames’s cock in his mouth. It’s velvet soft and feels good, so Hickey releases it frequently, waiting a few moments before putting his lips around it again. He glances up at Fitzjames, whose eyes are shut tightly but open every time Hickey takes his mouth away. He says nothing, but the squint and twitch of his lips are enough to imply _You bastard_.

Hickey smiles at that and raises his eyebrows. _I don’t know what else you expected._

He teases Fitzjames until he senses the Fitzjames might come from his nipple touched and the head of his cock alone being sucked so Hickey takes his hand away and slides his mouth down the entire length. He holds this position while Fitzjames gasps louder than he has yet. The ice sounds are subsiding so Hickey reaches up and presses his palm over Fitzjames’s mouth. He keeps it there, Fitzjames’s breath hot, as he releases the length of Fitzjames’s cock and runs a line up and down it with his tongue. Fitzjames bucks his hips and bites the top of Hickey’s finger, not hard enough to draw blood but enough that Hickey starts. He tries to keep his hand steady but Fitzjames won’t let it rest easy, teeth secure around Hickey’s knuckle. Hickey raises his whole head and looks up at Fitzjames with a bored look on his face even as he grits his own teeth. The standoff finally ends with Fitzjames releasing Hickey’s finger to immediately weave both his hands into Hickey’s hair to push his mouth back to his cock.

A good round in the ring, so Hickey reaches up and runs a fingertip again around Fitzjames’s nipple as he slides his cock in and out of his mouth. Fitzjames digs his nails into Hickey’s scalp so Hickey sucks him faster and harder until Fitzjames pushes himself so far into Hickey’s mouth and Hickey holds him there. Fitzjames yanks a hand from Hickey’s hair and holds it fast against his mouth as he bucks for only a moment more and arches his back as he comes.

Hickey feels like he can give Fitzjames a few moments of afterglow, so he waits a few moments, and then he’s up on his knees. Fitzjames’s eyes are closed and he’s still making small gasping noises so Hickey snaps his fingers near Fitzjames’s face until he opens his eyes while Hickey gestures at the bedframe. Fitzjames rolls his head to the side as his breathing calms down. His hair is spread across on the pillow on both sides, almost like wings. He’s really quite beautiful, so Hickey doesn’t want to see his face, but he doesn’t snap again. He waits as Fitzjames idly moves up onto his elbows and then his knees.

They’re both on their knees now, facing each other, Fitzjames’s cock softening and Hickey’s fully hard. Fitzjames reaches out as if to touch it and Hickey moves his hips slightly closer. Fitzjames draws his hand away immediately and tilts his head at Hickey. He nods it at Hickey’s cock and leans back on his hands, waiting. Hickey doesn’t take his eyes off him as he swirls his tongue in his mouth and brings his fingers to his lips. Before he can lick them, Fitzjames is upright and spits in his hand at rapid speed and runs his hand up and down Hickey’s cock twice. He gives Hickey a smug smile and keeps his eyes on him until he turns his body and grasps the bedframe.

The bastard. Well if he’s so keen on using his own mouth, he can have his way. Hickey takes one of Fitzjames’s hips and reaches two fingers around to Fitzjames’s mouth. Fitzjames reaches his tongue out and licks them up and down but not before biting one of them. _Bastard_. Hickey only pushes one finger into Fitzjames at first, not moving it once it’s inside. It’s still enough to make Fitzjames take one of his hands from the bedframe and cover his mouth as he moans. He pushes his whole forehead against it when Hickey finally slides both fingers in. Just as Fitzjames has moved his head away from the frame, Hickey crooks his fingers and Fitzjames jerks and groans, his hand shaking as he covers his mouth again. He tries to move himself back on Hickey’s fingers and Hickey lets him for a moment, lets him stretch himself. After all, it makes it all the easier for Hickey to pull his fingers out and spread him and line his cock up to his opening and push in and yes, it’s really true, he’s fucking Captain James Fitzjames up the arse and it’s so unlikely and so rich that it’s almost enough to make him believe in a queer God.

Hickey has fucked men up the arse more times than he or queer God can count but it never gets old. The glorious tightness, the overwhelming heat, the way he can move gently in and out or hard and fast, trying to give himself pleasure and seeing if can hit the spot of pleasure in the other man to show how good he is at was he does best. As his heart speeds up and ecstasy rides through his veins, he thinks he’s accomplished hitting the spot in Fitzjames, who is fucking himself back against Hickey as fast as Hickey is fucking into him. The creaking and cranking noises on the hull have stopped but Hickey won’t take his hands from Fitzjames’s hips and clearly Fitzjames won’t take his hands from the bars of the bedframe so they’re both making short gasps and long groans almost in unison. It doesn’t matter anymore if they’re quiet or not, stifling their voices with their hands and biting each other in the process. Hickey has never fucked anyone in a superior station in life and the fact that Fitzjames can’t seem to get enough of Hickey’s cock would make that worth it even if Hickey didn’t come. He prolongs it as long as he can, rocking hard into Fitzjames who bucks back onto him, then almost sliding out of Fitzjames completely. He can tell that this frustrates Fitzjames and that he’s trying not to huff as he stops moving his hips, patient for whenever Hickey decides to enter him again.

As Hickey does guide himself back in again, he wonders idly if Fitzjames is hard again. After a few more strokes, Fitzjames sighing loudly again, Hickey releases one of Fitzjames’s hips and reaches for his cock. He barely touches it before Fitzjames lets go of the bedframe briefly and swats Hickey’s hand away. But before Hickey can put his hand back on Fitzjames’s hip, Fitzjames has grabbed his hand back and wrapped it around his cock, which is indeed fully hard and is starting to spill. It’s time, then. Hickey lets himself lose control and thrusts in and in and in and moans as the valve of pleasure is fully opened and he comes, head thrown back, keening, just a moment before he can feel Fitzjames all over his hand. Fitzjames is breathing as if he’s just run a mile, head falling forward onto the bed frame as his chest rises and falls shallowly. He makes no move to pull himself free from Hickey, so Hickey stays inside him as he lowers himself forward onto Fitzjames’s back, the afterglow more satisfying than looking at the Aurora Borealis. Fitzjames’s back is slick with sweat, as is Hickey’s whole face. He stays pressed against his skin for a moment, chest still heaving, and then he takes his hand that wasn’t around Fitzjames’s cock and touches the soft waves of Fitzjames’s hair. Fitzjames doesn’t move but for his breathing beginning to even out. Hickey continues separating the waves of Fitzjames’s hair and Fitzjames lets him. The only question that remains is whether Hickey will pull out or Fitzjames will pull himself off. That’s solved when Fitzjames moves away, gets off the bed, and pads into the outer cabin, leaving Hickey alone.

Hickey lies down on his side for awhile and closes his eyes for a minute before he opens them and listens to the complete silence. He can’t hear Fitzjames moving around. What is he doing? Hickey pushes himself upright and gathers his clothes quickly. He’ll have to leave before Fitzjames can break the silence. He’s shaking his trousers out when the book drops onto the bed next to him, the cover bouncing up and then closing with a _snap_.

***

“He never finished it, you see, he was killed before he could, but he wrote enough that you can see the theme quite explicitly.”

“Who’s the boy? Leander?”

“Yes. He’s ‘all that men desire’ in his beauty. He’s swimming across the ocean, trying to reach Hero, when Neptune finds him. You know Neptune?”

“Of course. I’m not deaf to sailors talking.”

“Indeed. Well, Neptune swims to him and mistakes him for Ganymede – that’s Zeus’s favorite boy cup-bearer – and he won’t stop following and touching Leander and essentially tries to make love to him in the water.”

“Show me.”

Fitzjames tilts the book towards Hickey and points on the page. He rolls his head back on the pillow and closes his eyes as Hickey reads.

“‘He watched his arms, and as they opened wide, at every stroke, betwixt them would he slide, and steal a kiss.’” Hickey raises his eyebrows. “That’s good.”

“Keep reading.”

Hickey skims and reads, “‘…pry upon his breast, his thighs, and every limb, and up again, and close beside him swim, and-’”

“‘-and talk of love..’” Fitzjames finishes the line in time with Hickey and rolls onto his side. “We would do that, he and me, in the order Marlowe wrote. First the breast.” He touches the hollow of Hickey’s throat and then runs his fingertip down Hickey’s chest and to his waist. “Then the thighs.” He moves the pad of his thumb around the inside one of Hickey’s thighs, then the other. “And then every limb.” He brushes all his fingers down Hickey’s arm and then leans back again. “It was a very good prelude to making love.”

“Did you recite the poem too while you did it?”

“He’d call me Leander sometimes.”

“Wasn’t that awkward? Him talking to you with his mouth around your prick?”

“You know what I mean.”

“Of course I do. A right pair of lovebirds, the two of you.”

“Quite.” Fitzjames takes the book back from him and holds his finger in the page. “This book changed everything. We thought we were alone, the two of us. It was me who found it, you know. I liked plays in old English. They made me concentrate, helped me pass the time at sea. This book was better than any Shakespeare I’d read. It ends badly, Edward the Second. We found that out quickly, long before he performed it. The King and his lover both die. But Leander never has a chance to. He lives forever, being adored by Neptune before he makes it to the shore. That was enough for us. It still is.”

Fitzjames leans up and gently slides the book under his pillow. “I was passing by Bridgens’s berth and I heard something fall. It was this book. I picked it up and accidentally took it with me when someone called me in the next corridor. By the time I came back to return it to him, he’d already gone to sleep. That’s why I’m returning it to him in the morning. There is nothing else to be said about the matter. You never touched this book.”

Hickey inclines his head. “I’ve never even seen it. In fact, what’s it called again?”

Fitzjames nods without looking at him. He lays the back of his hand against Hickey’s thigh and strokes it. “This never happened, Mr. Hickey. And it will never not have happened. It’s like a play in a book no one will ever read. Do you understand?”

“Aye, Captain.” Hickey returns the touch to Fitzjames’s thigh and they stroke each other in silence for a few moments. Hickey takes away his hand first, picks up his scattered clothes and boots, dresses, and adjusts his collar while he watches Fitzjames on the bed, naked, not moving, eyes steady on Hickey’s. Still simmering some emotion, some fresh erotic encounter, some past flame. Lovely eyes, really. They must have been even brighter when he was young. Easy to see how another boy could have fallen in love with him.

Hickey gazes back at him. He wonders what Fitzjames sees in his eyes. And then he doesn’t wonder, not because he can’t figure it out, but because he couldn’t care less. He’s already a queer murderer. How could he, or anyone else, top that for the Devil’s pleasure?

He finishes adjusting his collar. “Captain.” He inclines his head.

Fitzjames nods at him, and then nods at the cabin’s entrance. “Mr. Hickey. You’re dismissed.”

Hickey takes a step toward the door, stops, and touches his shoulder. He’s eager to get a look at those bruises. He turns back to Fitzjames, whose fingers are touching the blossoming red and purple marks on either side of his neck. He’ll be able to cover them with his collar and Hickey will cover his own bruises with his shirt. So easy to hide. Or expose. Whatever you choose.

Fucking a man or killing him. It’s all the same when the world has bruised you first for not being like other men, slapped you into silence, pressed its boot on your face, bloodied your knuckles when you try to fight back.

He fights anyway, and so does Fitzjames, in his way. They’re really quite a pair.

It never happened. It was all acting.

But by the devil, it was always well played.


End file.
